Night and Morning with Bhikkhu Tissa

subtler aspect. This is the suffering or unsatisfactoriness of the saòkháras, the formations or elements of worldlyexistence themselves.Gene: How can mere formations “suffer”?Bhikkhu Tissa: According to the Buddha, all formations are impermanent. They are unstable, dependent,transitory, forever arising and subsiding, subject to change and decay. Within this change, this vast unrest,there is no permanence to be found and thus no stable peace. The components of our bodies hold togetheronly temporarily; gradually or swiftly they break up. Body and mind both are ultimately masses of mentaland material happenings that will not hold still. Change never stops. Internally and externally the world onevery level is always subject to arising and breaking up, rearranging, falling away, disintegrating.Gene: What a thought! Ordinary pain, then, as bad as it is, is not the only kind of suffering.Bhikkhu Tissa: The very processes of existence, which bring us ordinary pain and pleasure, arethemselves flawed. Because of their instability, their unrest, they are untrustworthy—always tending toproduce new suffering. They give us no firm floor to stand on.Gene: But, Bhikkhu Tissa, there is happiness in the world. There are still joys and satisfactions andpleasures and many good and worthy things.Bhikkhu Tissa: Yes, that’s true. Certainly good things exist. But when the Buddha says that all formationsare dukkha he means that even when they are not manifestly painful, even when they are pleasant, theyalways have a liability to affliction. They are dukkha because they can’t last, can’t hold up.Gene: Suffering, then, is not always outright pain and misery? It can be just this elemental uncertainty orinstability?Bhikkhu Tissa: Yes. And that inevitably brings up, you see, another aspect of our suffering. Besides thefelt, experienced pain of body and mind, besides the uncertainty of all formations, there is the sufferinginherent in change. You see, even the good things, the beautiful and delightful things, become sources of actualpain on account of their fundamental nature.Gene: How can that be?Bhikkhu Tissa: They change, they pass away, and when they do we regret it; we suffer. Isn’t this natural?Anything we like, we want to last. But it cannot. Can you in fact think of anything in this world, anythingvaluable and important to you, which is immune to change, which can never grow old, which can neverdisappear, which can never disappoint you?Gene (frowning, thinking): No…. I can’t think of anything like that. All the good things—and the bad, too—are temporary, as far as I can tell.Bhikkhu Tissa: And don’t forget the desires themselves—the desires for the agreeable and pleasant things.They too arise and pass away unpredictably, and what you wanted yesterday you may no longer want today.Gene: I guess that’s true. Objects change and my opinions and desires change too. Likes and dislikes arevariable.Bhikkhu Tissa: There it is again, you see—the idea you came in with. Impermanence.Gene: Well, yes, you’re right. Impermanence!Bhikkhu Tissa: The word that popped into your mind when the dragonfly flew away.Gene: Impermanence again. This is what you meant, I guess, when you spoke of returning to primarymatters. This dukkha, venerable sir, is more formidable than I imagined. What a universe this is! And here Ithought you might cheer me up!Bhikkhu Tissa (smiling): Ah, but let’s investigate more. Let’s follow the Buddha a little further, shall we?(Outside, in the distance, lightning flickers suddenly. After a moment the rumble of thunder is heard. Gene raises hishead and gazes out into the darkness.)Gene: Uh-oh, we’re going to get some rain. Maybe a thunderstorm.Bhikkhu Tissa (easily): Quite likely. But it will pass; it will change. Just more impermanence, right?6